Odyssey Toys’ Pocket Drone more than lives up to its name

By Will Fulton Published July 8, 2016

Odyssey Toys’ Pocket Drone is one of the most compact flying machines we’ve ever encountered. We spoke with Odyssey’s Vice President Steven Irigoyen on the floor at CE Week to learn a bit more about it.

True to its name, the Pocket Drone fits easily in your pocket, and is about the size and shape of an iPhone when collapsed. The remote control is about the same size, and similarly collapses down, with interior storage for the removable control stick. Both fit into a pouch that Irigoyen pulls easily out of his blazer’s inside pocket.

Recommended Videos

It takes only a minute to unfold the drone’s four small rotors from its corners and assemble the control before it’s zipping around our heads. In flight, it can be set to maintain altitude, making it particularly easy for novice pilots to get off the ground and stay there. On board, it has an 8GB memory card to hold HD video and 2.3 MP pictures taken with its front-mounted camera.

There are smaller drones out there, but none to our knowledge that are as easy to fly, record high-quality pictures and video, and cost just $100. Odyssey’s Pocket Drone is available now through Sharper Image, with wider distribution to come.

Former Staff Writer, Gaming

Will Fulton is a New York-based writer and theater-maker. In 2011 he co-founded mythic theater company AntiMatter Collective…

Topics

Emerging Tech

I let Gemini take care of my houseplants, and they’ve never looked better

Study guide created by Gemini

I am, by every reasonable measure, a serial plant killer. I've lost count of the pothos, the peace lilies, the one very expensive fiddle-leaf fig that judged me silently for a month before giving up entirely. My problem was never a lack of love. It was that I'd either drown them out of guilt or forget they existed for a fortnight, with no middle ground. So when I started leaning on Gemini for the odd everyday question, letting it babysit my plants wasn't some grand plan. It happened almost by accident, and now my flat looks like something a person with their life together would own.

It started the way most of my plant emergencies do, with a leaf going a color it definitely shouldn't. Instead of doom-scrolling through contradictory Google searches like I usually would, I snapped a photo, handed it to Gemini, and asked what was wrong. What I got back was a proper answer, and it was the first of many.

Emerging Tech

I underestimated this NotebookLM feature until it completely changed how I study

google-adds-data-tables-feature-in-notebooklm

I'll admit it: I ignored NotebookLM's Mind Maps feature for far longer than I should have. I mostly used the app to ask questions about my documents or generate Audio Overviews and Short Video Overviews, while that little Mind Map button sat untouched. I assumed it was more of a nice-to-have than something I'd actually use. Turns out, I was completely wrong.

I stopped drowning in my own notes

Emerging Tech

The Concorde dream is within reach. NASA X-59 just has to silence the supersonic boom

The jet built to kill the sonic boom just reached full speed

Lockheed Martin’s X-59

NASA has already proved that its needle-nosed X-59 can move seriously fast in recent test flights. Now, the next step is to find out whether it can break the sound barrier without announcing its arrival to everyone below. The experimental aircraft recently reached Mach 1.4, or about 924 mph (1,487 kph), at an altitude of 55,000 feet. Those are the target conditions NASA plans to use during future tests of the X-59’s quieter sonic signature, making the flight a major milestone for the agency’s Quesst mission.

NASA’s supersonic jet has reached full speed